ISLAMABAD: On 31st December 2025, the Associated Press of Pakistan published a story about the Shaheen Chowk Underpass being completed. The story was titled “Shaheen Chowk underpass completed in record time; Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi Inaugurates Project”.
This story ends with the following sentence: “If you’d like, I can also prepare a shorter version, a more formal print style, or a headline in multiple options.” This means the story was clearly written by an AI chatbot. It is very common for such chatbots to end their messages with such questions or suggestions.
What makes this interesting is that Associated Press of Pakistan is one of the biggest news agencies in Pakistan. Additionally, it is state-owned. For it to publish content that is AI-generated is embarrassing. The editors did not even edit the obvious AI markers.
APP’s use of AI adds to the debate of using AI for creating news. Some say it is the future, while others strongly reject AI use. They suggest that news is sensitive and should always be produced by humans.
This is similar to DAWN’s blunder a few months ago. DAWN published a story in its printed newspaper where a similar AI response was printed for everyone to see. DAWN’s response was to reassure its readers that it strongly opposes the use of AI in writing news, and it will ensure it does not happen again.
Whether Artificial Intelligence should be used to write news is a very long debate. However, the editors should at least pay this much attention that AI suggestions are not published and printed in their news.
The news was published on 31st December 2025, and is still available on the APP website.
